Medical and surgical procedures main reasons for medical indemnity claims

A new report by the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare (AIHW) shows that claims for harm or loss alleged to have resulted from an error or negligence in a medical or surgical procedure made up over 34% (2,361 claims) of all medical indemnity claims in the public sector in 2005-06.

The ‘Medical indemnity national data collection public sector 2005-06 Report’ examined the 6,922 claims that were active during the year, and found that 19.8% (1,372 claims) related to diagnosis issues, such as a failure to correctly diagnose a problem or a misdiagnosis.

Treatment issues, such as delayed treatment, failure to provide treatment, and complications arising from treatment were the reasons for 13.7% (946 claims) of medical indemnity claims.

Examples included failure to perform a procedure, having the wrong procedure performed, having a procedure performed on the wrong part of the body, post-operative complications and failure of procedure.

Settlement through court decisions represented 4% of finalised claims, with most claims being settled through dispute resolution or other processes.

The majority (83.3%) of claims closed in the 2005-06 financial year had a total claim size of less than $100,000 including 458 claims where no payment was made. Just under 4% of claims were settled for payments in excess of $500,000.